1791, which
corresponds to the life of the Baron.

Baron de Trumilly welcomed Balzac into his home, took a great interest
in his work, and seemed willing to give him one of his three
daughters; but one can understand how the young novelist, who had not
yet attained great fame, might not favorably impress a young lady of
the social standing of Mademoiselle de Trumilly, and her father did
not urge her to accept him.

Although Balzac wrote Madame Hanska that when he called the girl loved
by Dr. Benassis in his "Confession" (Le Medecin de Campagne)
"Evelina," he said to himself, "She will quiver with joy in seeing
that her name has occupied me, that she was present to my memory, and
that what I deemed loveliest and noblest in the young girl, I have
named for her," some think that the lady he had in mind was not Mme.
Hanska, but Eleonore de Trumilly, who really was a young unmarried
girl, while Madame Hanska was not only married, but the mother of
several children. Again, letters written by the author to his family
show his condition to have been desperate at that time. Balzac asserts
that the story of _Louis Lambert_ is true to life; hence, despondent
over his own situation, he makes Louis Lambert become insane, and
causes Dr. Benassis to think of suicide when disappointed in love.

Thus was the novelist doomed, early in his literary career, to meet
with a disappointment which, as has been seen, was to be repeated some
months later with more serious results, when his adoration for the
Duchesse de Castries was suddenly turned into bitterness.

MADAME HANSKA.--LA COMTESSE MNISZECH.--MADEMOISELLE BOREL.
--MESDEMOISELLES WYLEZYNSKA.--LA COMTESSE ROSALIE RZEWUSKA.
--MADEMOISELLE CALISTE RZEWUSKA.--MADAME CHERKOWITSCH.
--MADAME RIZNITSCH.--LA COMTESSE MARIE POTOCKA.

"And they talk of the first love! I know nothing as terrible as the
last, it is strangling."

The longest and by far the most important of Balzac's friendships
began by correspondence was the one with Madame Eveline Hanska, whose
first letter arrived February 28, 1832. The friendship soon developed
into a more sentimental relationship culminating March 14, 1850, when
Madame Hanska became Madame Honore de Balzac. This "grand and
beautiful soul-drama" is one of the noblest in the world, and in the
history of literature the longest.

So long was Balzac in pursuit of this apparent chimera, and so ardent
was his passion for his "pol